Spread Networks Plans November Service Launch

Financial services network provider Spread Networks expects its first clients to go live on the vendor's commercial wavelength service over its low-latency northern New Jersey–Chicago fiber optic link starting Nov. 1.

Each client will have a service level agreement (SLA) ensuring that latency between the vendor's points-of-presence (PoPs) in the Verizon datacenter in Carteret, NJ, and 350 East Cermak in Chicago never exceeds 15.75 milliseconds.

"That will be the maximum latency," says David Barksdale, CEO of Spread Networks. "Operationally, it will more likely be around 15.72 milliseconds."

To avoid bandwidth sharing, each client will be outfitted with a dedicated 1 Gbps or 10 Gbps wavelength, which should take two weeks to provision. "We are committed to a 14-day delivery," says Barksdale.

The vendor lit its dark-fiber network earlier this year and partnered with equipment providers to allow users to access it, without the latency found in traditional telco networks, according to officials at the time. Spread Networks built its network using a dispersion compensating fiber, TrueWave RS, from optical fiber vendor OFS to reduce the need for additional dispersion compensation.

Spread Networks also located optical amplification and regeneration facilities to minimize hops and therefore further reduce latency, according to Barksdale at the time. In addition, Spread's is a dedicated, private fiber network, designed for low-latency messaging, and not the wider range of services handled by traditional telcos on their cables, he added.